Go For Gold, But Make It Quick

I caught this a couple days ago. There'll be rule changes with regards to extra-innings Olympic baseball. Apparently baseball is too slow for Olympic standards of sport, and officials aren't crazy about the concept of baseball games capable of continuing forever. What's the silliest, most T-ball way to end an extra-inning baseball game? The IOC came up with these adjustments.

1) From the 11th inning on, teams are allowed to put a runner on first and second base prior to the first pitch.
2) In the 11th inning, teams can start the inning from any point of their batting lineup.

So, come the 11th, I could put my 1-spot hitter on second base, my #2 guy on first, and bring to bat my #3 slugger. Or I could put the 9-spot hitter on second, put the #1 guy on first, and bring to bat my #2 hitter.

At least they're not deciding tie games with a home-run derby.

I suppose I can understand why they'd want to speed up long games. Baseball, as far as I can tell, is the longest Olympic sport. It doesn't take runners three hours to finish a marathon. It doesn't take soccer players three hours to complete a match. It doesn't take sprinters three hours to run the 100m dash. If a baseball game were to go long it could seriously interfere with scheduling, and that could interfere with athletes getting to and from where they need to be, and that could interfere with performance. There's also TV scheduling, which is probably a more important factor in the eyes of those who run the Games.

But on the other hand I don't really care about all that. It'd be nice if everything were to follow the schedules exactly, but if that can't happen then just deal with it. Athletes can wait another hour (or two or three) for the ball game to finish before playing theirs. TV-wise, water polo coverage can wait. It's all pre-recorded anyway for North American viewers, isn't it?

There's also the issue of who gets credited with what stats. When the instant runner on second base comes around to score the winning run the pitcher will get credited with the loss, but will the run be attributed to him? He wasn't responsible for the runners on first and second, but they weren't put there by errors or anything. Unearned? Runner reaches second via IOC ruling? Ghost runner on first? What do you do with your scorecard?

This is the last year for Olympic baseball, at least for a while. It's goofy things like this that'll prevent me from missing it too much. It's the lack of big names, too. Big League teams won't let their star players miss a handful of games to play in the Olympics, and that's completely understandable. The Nippon Professional Baseball league allows their players to join the Japanese National Team, but it's not quite the same, especially when they're playing American minor-league players. By the way, do you know how the Nippon league gets around the issue of too-long baseball? Calling a tie after the 12th inning. It's far more sensible than magically adding base runners.

Will I watch Olympic baseball? If it's being broadcast I will.
Will I root for the Americans? Absolutely. Go, guys I've never heard of!

As an aside, check out the roster for the Canadian National Baseball team. Rheal Cormier... still around? Stubby Clapp, coming out of retirement? Chris Reitsma, who hasn't played a game since March? It should be interesting.

Statistical Foray: World Series Hitting Streaks

I recently acquired a children's book (I read at a third grade level) about the life of Roberto Clemente. At the end of the book is a picture of his Hall of Fame plaque. There were the career highlights and such, but one piece of information caught my eye.

"BATTED .362 IN TWO WORLD SERIES, HITTING IN ALL 14 GAMES."

Every single World Series game Clemente played in he got at least one hit. That's outstanding. But is it the record? Are there longer World Series hitting streaks?

Initially I didn't think there'd be any easy way to do the research. But fortunately for me Baseball-Reference.com has opened up their Play Index to non-subscribers until the 19th of July. What this means is I am very nearly able to look up everything that ever happened ever.

Just go to the batting streak finder,
click "Postseason,"
click the "Series/Game" drop down menu to read WS (any game),
click "Consecutive Hs" on the far right,
click "Get Results,"
then get results.

Yankee outfielder Hank Bauer holds the record with 17 consecutive World Series games with at least one hit. Very impressive. With the Yankees during their decade of dominance, Bauer played in far more than 17 games. In fact he played in 53 World Series games, and accruing a hit in each of those contests would have been an unfathomable feat (though if we're talking streaks of 50+ games I can think of one person who was probably capable of doing it).

Bauer hadn't fared so well at the plate prior to his hitting streak. In his World Series appearances from 1949 to 1955 (32 games) he batted .202, had an on-base percentage of .265, and a slugging percentage of only .245. Zero home runs, zero doubles (though two triples to his credit). He was even caught stealing in his only two attempts. But from Game 1 of the '56 Series to Game 3 of the '58 Series he was a monster. Seventeen games, 24 hits, .316 batting average, .605 slugging percentage, six homers, two doubles, and a triple. And this time he was 1-for-1 in stolen base attempts. Go Hank!

But despite this sudden burst of hitting his strikeouts-per-at-bat ratio went way up.
First 32 games: 9 strikeouts in 94 at-bats.
Next 17 games: 13 strikeouts in 76 at-bats.
I get the feeling Casey Stengel told Bauer to just go up there and hit the ball real hard.

Bauer went 0-for-4 in Game 4 of the '58 Series to end the streak, but singled in Game 5 and homered in Game 6.


Next on the list with the second-longest World Series hitting streak is... Marquis Grissom?
Grissom was an average hitter but was a consistently awesome hitter during the World Series. Hit managed hits in his first 15 World Series games, ultimately hitting safely in 17 of 19 (and reached base safely in all but his final World Series game). During his 15 game hitting streak he hit an astounding .452, had an OBP of .500, hit 4 doubles, a triple, and stole 4 bases. He didn't hit any home runs, but he came around to score 11 times anyway (add that to his 8 RBIs and he played a part in 19 runs scored).


Third is another great Yankee, Derek Jeter. As an active player I suppose he still has an opportunity to break Bauer's record, but it seems less and less likely with each passing season.

From Game 6 of the 1996 World Series to Game 5 of the 2000 World Series Jeter hit in 14 consecutive games, same as Clemente. Jeter's 14 games were very similar to Clemente's 14 games with a few key exceptions.
Similarities:

- Jeter, 60 at-bats. Clemente, 58 at-bats.
- Jeter, 22 hits. Clemente, 21 hits.
- Jeter, .367 batting average. Clemente, .362 batting average.
- Jeter, 3 doubles, 2 homers, 1 triple. Clemente, 2 doubles, 2 homers, 1 triple.
Differences:
- Jeter, 4 steals. Clemente, 0 steals (though stolen bases are inconsequential to hitting stats).
- Jeter, 7 walks. Clemente, 2 walks.
- Jeter, 15 (!) strikeouts. Clemente, 6 strikeouts.
- Jeter, 15 (!) runs. Clemente, 4 runs.

Unlike Clemente, Jeter did not get a hit in every World Series game he played in (though a hit in 26 out of 32 games is still very good). And since nobody besides all the players we just mentioned have hit in 14 consecutive World Series games, Clemente holds the record for most World Series games with a hit where that same player had zero World Series games without a hit. It sounds wordy, but you know what I mean. Clemente got a hit in every World Series game he played, and he's the only one to do it with 14 games.

Who has the next longest streak for hits in all his World Series games? Riggs Stephenson who, for the Cubs in the 1929 and 1932 World Series, played in 9 games, hit .378, had 7 RBIs, and slapped 12 singles and 2 doubles. But despite his best efforts the Cubs lost 8 of those 9 games.

Who's the highest active player who's had a hit in all of his World Series games? Garret Anderson with seven. They were all accumulated during the 2002 World Series. If Anderson were to find himself in another seven-game series he'd have a shot at Clemente's mark. It's unlikely but possible.

As always mentioned during any discussion concerning Roberto Clemente, there's no telling what he could have accomplished given a few more years to do so. The Pirates fell to the Reds in the 1972 NLCS (where Clemente played his last games), and perhaps he could have given them the three wins they needed in 1973 to reach the playoffs again. Always a great hitter and outstanding fielder, he might've had enough left in the tank to advance the Pirates to the World Series in 1974 and 1975 (where they fell to the Dodgers and Reds, respectively, in the NLCSs). Tragically he was never given the chance to advance his World Series hitting streak or build upon his other great achievements. But there is no question that he seized the opportunities he was given and left a unique mark upon baseball.